In Texas, there are many spiritual practices with deep lineages and rich heritages. I’m always inspired by the ways people keep these practices alive and continue to honor their ancestors. For many people who look like me, when they start exploring deity work, they begin by reading about the better-known Celtic or Greek pantheons. I, myself, spent a lot of time connecting with Hestia after hearing her call at the beginning of last year. But the practical side of me, which has only a surface-level understanding of my family history, knew that I had no deep ties that took me back to the land and people who originally worshipped her, or any of the more popular deities, for that matter.

For much of my life, I’ve been curious about my roots-the ones that extend beyond the rolling hills of East Tennessee. Growing up in the South comes with a mixed bag of ancestral legacy, not all of it good and not all of it I’m proud of. I’ve written a lot about unpacking that and composting parts of that legacy that were a little dark.

Part of the work I did untangling my own religious web, born from evangelical Christianity, was discovering that most of the folks I descended from had a pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon practice that later blended with Christianity and eventually sailed across the ocean into Appalachia, the place I was born.

The practice came from Scotland, Ireland, and England and ended up in the hills of the Smokies, where it began to adapt and incorporate Indigenous American, African, and German teachings. It was a mixed bag, which, in some ways, feels appropriate for a religion born of immigrants. Even though I spent most of my childhood with my nose in a Bible, many of the sayings and superstitions came from a place more connected to the earth.

Digging deeper into the past, before the ships sailed and before Christianity got involved, I finally found the pagan roots, referred to as Anglo-Saxon heathenry, which shows up a bit softer and a lot less macho than the Norse heathenry it likely descended from. This version was more focused on earth-based practices and worshiped the deity in a way that made a bit more sense to me—no offense to any Norse heathens out there.

The problem is that when I went to find the books that would unlock my ancestral traditions, I found that they were hard to come by or just didn’t exist at all. When these older ways were being followed, they weren’t always written down, and much of the documented history of them came much later and often by people who actually didn’t even practice.

The most notorious witness to what my bloodline would have practiced comes from a monk named Bede, who was documenting the history of the calendar around the year 730.

His observations are the reason we know so much about that time today. He wrote about Modranicht, or Mother Night, which occurs in late December, and Blod-monath, the blood month of November, when animals that couldn’t be fed through the winter were slaughtered and salted for preservation.

I’ve come across Bede before while reading other historical books and initially had a bias against him because he was a Christian monk—I could only assume he had an opinion about the pagan practices he was documenting.

The thing I will give him credit for is his honesty. Ronald Hutton also writes about a lot of events of this time and makes a note about Eostre where Bede says that Easter took its name from a goddess called Eostre. Around April you’ll see all of social media saying this is where Easter comes from. But Hutton mentions that this has “been often quoted without any inspection or criticism” and that it falls into the category of interpretations which Bede admitted to be purely his own rather than some proven fact.

Bede does a better job of disclosing his hypothesis than anyone online does of their use of AI. But even though he disclosed that he was making assumptions, we still quote most of what he wrote as fact.

Even Hutton doesn’t present the Eostre claim as fact. He says one could argue that Eostre was a real Germanic dawn-goddess because of the word’s origins. It’s also logical to suggest the month-name simply meant the month of opening. Bede connected it to a goddess who may not have existed, but he doesn’t correct either origin.

Did my ancestors worship a spring goddess… apparently this remains to be seen. And that's why most of my practice remains eclectic and is shaped by my own personal story.

It would be a bit negligent of me to leave out the part I came across that I didn’t enjoy. And I feel like sharing it as a warning for anyone else who looks like me and is starting this journey of discovering where you come from.

It wasn’t long before I stumbled into spaces within modern Heathenry that have shifted toward white nationalism. Margot Adler, who I often reference in my work, spent decades writing about American Paganism. She wrote that when her first book came out, she intentionally omitted Heathenry because she was torn about the material she was collecting. She also noted that many Heathens she spoke with in the 80s put a heavy emphasis “not only on ancestry but on a belief in the primacy of genetics.” She added that all Heathens eventually have to confront the confusion about where Nazism fits into their story because of the Norse symbols they tend to use. But the more you look, the more you find that every religion has its complicated roots. And by saying that, I’m not excusing it; it’s important to learn all the ways your religion or practice has shown up over the years, because it lets you do something about it today.

Frankie Castanea wrote an incredible book about Ancestral Magic that helped shape how I approach this kind of lineage seeking today. In it, she says that reconnection requires focusing on accountability, anti-racism, and respect for the culture and the folk you’re working to connect with. If you can't hold those things when trying to reconnect with whatever rocky past you come from, it probably isn’t really reconnection.

I mean, obviously not. I’ve just started down this curious path and have only recently purchased a handful of books and downloaded a few podcasts to help me unpack it a bit more. I have more questions now than when I started, which I think is the right place to be.

What I’m most excited to explore more is clearer paths to what my ancestors might have actually practiced, however dispersed they may be. Even if an opinionated Christian monk documented everything in 730, at least it’s a place to start. These practices seem closely aligned with working with the earth, plants, and animals around you, which was unexpected but felt a little more like home than other paths I’ve explored.

There is also a little irony in sharing this write-up during an equinox: one whose modern name, only about 50 years old, will be debated as an ancient legacy in the many posts about Mabon that will no doubt be presenting themselves in our algorithms this week.

The deeper part of all of this that I want to explore a little in October is: why do I keep craving some legacy that’s older or more pagan in its ancestry to guide me as I age? But that will be a question for the darker half of the year.

Happy Equinox, friends.

xo,
Chad

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